


The Gray Lifeless Days

by Kaza999



Series: Clear Skies [2]
Category: Skulduggery Pleasant - Derek Landy
Genre: Gen, NOT a high school au, no no this is something very different, okay and now we have some context
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-20
Updated: 2013-07-20
Packaged: 2017-12-20 20:13:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/891386
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kaza999/pseuds/Kaza999
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A brief history of Stephanie Edgely, sans magic.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Gray Lifeless Days

**Author's Note:**

> Okay so here is some much needed context for the Clear Skies verse. I'll elaborate on lots of these later, and probably focus on the magic end of things more once I get the timeline straightened out, but for now we have this.

Melissa's car broke down just as they were leaving Gordon's house. 

Stephanie insisted on staying there for a few hours, while her mother got the car towed. She loved Gordon's big old house, and since it was technically hers now, she wanted to see what it was like when she was the only one there. Then, just after sunset, Melissa came back, and they went home, and that was the end of that. 

They found out two days later that Gordon's house had been broken into the same day they had been visiting. Nothing had been taken, but the door had been thrown off its hinges, and there were curious scorch marks all over the main room. 

“It's a good thing you didn't have to stay any longer than you did!” Melissa exclaimed upon hearing the news. 

Stephanie wasn't really sure what to think. She supposed she was glad. She wouldn't have wanted to be in a house that was being robbed.

However, for some reason, she couldn't help but feel a little disappointed.   
… … …  
Stephanie entered secondary school with a firm reputation as a complete weirdo. 

She hadn't really spoken to anyone over the summer, hadn't returned anyone's calls or gone out. So by the time she went back to school, she was completely out of the loop on pretty much everything.

She didn't really care, though. Nothing about her peers interested her anymore. They had gone and become boring behind her back, started talking about inane, _ordinary_ things, and so she didn't feel like speaking to them. 

It didn't matter that it made her no friends. She didn't care that she was more often than not left all alone.

She didn't.   
… … …  
Magic wasn't real.

Magic _wasn't real._

Everyone knew that. Even Crazy Stephanie knew that. Oh, yes, she knew that. When her father had sat her down and told her that Uncle Gordon had been mentally ill, and all his stories were just symptoms of it, she knew. When her former friends started hating her for no other reason than that she was different than them, she knew. With every passing day, she knew more and more that there was no magic to be had in the whole wide world.

Inexplicably, it made her heart hurt to know that. When she was younger, she had thought that the world was full of wonder and secrets and mysteries, terrible and dangerous things, monsters and demons and angels and all sorts. 

But the world was terrible, and the world was cruel. 

It was just that it was all an ordinary cruelty. There were no beautiful mysteries to be had. The night sky was cold and dark and inaccessible besides. The oceans were polluted and dying. The forests were being felled, the air was being choked, the whole world was going to come crashing in but it was all ordinary. It was all things that the strong humans had done to the rest of the humans. Just humans spilling human blood, on a pathetic human world. 

There was nothing else to be had. The only thing anyone could do was make the best of the matter, and hope it would all turn out alright in the end.  
… … …  
Talking just got you into trouble.

This was something Stephanie learned early on.

If you talked back at a teacher, you got punished, even if you were right. If you said the wrong thing around your fellow students, you got ostracized, even if the thing you said made sense. The more you talked the more likely it was to make people hate you, and Stephanie didn't need any more of that than she already had.

Speech was a luxury the well-liked and the well-armed had, neither of which described her. 

And it wasn't like people ever really appreciated wit, anyway.

So, Stephanie, who had once been ever so chatty, decided to stop speaking altogether. Well, that was, unless someone asked her a direct question. Then it was just a matter of waiting them out, seeing how dedicated they really were to finding the answer.

Being silent was good in another way, too. It made her frightening.

People were already scared of her, with her dead uncle and her black clothes and her perpetual scowl, but being silent made her have an aura of dread that she quite liked. This way, people didn't like to bother her. 

It also meant that people didn't reach out to her. But she didn't mind. That didn't matter to her so much.  
… … …  
“What do you want to do when you get out of school, Stephanie?”

Stephanie spoke without thinking. “A detective.”

There were hushed giggles throughout the classroom. Stephanie furrowed her brow and hunched her shoulders. Her hands shook, and she snapped the pencil she was holding. Getting drawn into a conversation in class was a mistake. 

“I see,” said the teacher, disregarding the laughter of her classmates. “That's an...interesting choice.”

Stephanie narrowed her eyes at him. She could hear the implied insult in his words. 'Interesting.' Right. What he really meant was 'ridiculous,' but he was too cowardly to actually say that out loud. There was an awkward pause wherein she glowered at him and he expected her to speak. She did not. After a long moment, he moved on to another student.

A soft hum filled Stephanie's head as she drowned him out. Drowned them all out. Served her right for answering the question. 

Don't speak. Don't ever answer. Don't give them the satisfaction, don't give them your time. It's the only way to fight back.  
… … …  
Stephanie was stuck in a stuffy office after school hours, in front of a middle aged man with sandy hair and a nose that stuck out too much to be entirely dignified. This particular middle aged man happened to be her History teacher. She never remembered his name. When you didn't talk to someone, there didn't seem to be much point. 

“You're a smart girl, Stephanie, and I just don't want to see you wasting your potential like this.”

Stephanie focused her attention on the wall behind him. It wasn't a particularly interesting wall, but it was better than listening to him. 

“I wish you'd talk more in class. I really think you have a lot to say.”

Sure she did. Just not to him. Not to any of them. 

Talking in class was a waste of effort. Anything she said was met with replies that made her want to punch people. Many of them. Right in the face. She did the school work, what else did he want from her?

He tried to catch her eye. “Stephanie...” he sighed when she determinedly looked away from him. “I really think if you tried harder, you could accomplish a lot.”

Don't say anything. Don't speak. Don't rise to the bait. Language didn't work on these people. Words and wit and intelligence didn't work. It didn't matter if she didn't talk to him because he wouldn't listen anyway. Nobody listened. That was something she'd figured out quite a while ago. 

He continued to speak. She ignored him. She repeated a song in her head, over and over again. It helped to drown him out. 

“I know how hard it can be to speak up, sometimes, but--”

She snapped her head around to glare directly into his eyes, and he cut himself off quite suddenly. He had no idea. He had no idea what he was talking about. 

Hard to speak up? Oh no. That was the easy part. The hard part was getting people to listen. 

He regained his composure quickly. “--but you should.”

Alright. That was enough. She glanced at the clock. She'd been here for a full hour already. She stood up and picked up her backpack.

His face grew stony. “We're not finished here, yet, Stephanie.” 

She raised an eyebrow at him. “I think we are.” 

Disregarding completely any protests he might have made, she walked out. He never tried to speak to her outside of class again.  
… … …  
“Get your hand off me.” she growled, deep in her throat.

The other boy blinked. “So you _do_ talk!” he exclaimed, that sleazy smile coming back in full force.

“Your hand. Off of my shoulder.”

“Hey, c'mon--”

That was enough warning. She considered him. Her forehead was about level with his nose. 

So she did the obvious thing.  
… … ...  
“You broke his _nose_?”

Stephanie glared at the floor. "Yes."

“Stephanie--” Melissa sighed and threaded her fingers through her hair. Desmond still looked a little dazed. "At least tell us _why?_ "

"Already told you. He bothered me."

"According to your teacher, he was just talking to you."

Stephanie shook her head. 

"Well, if he was bothering you, I don't see the problem," said Desmond airily. "He should have known better."

Stephanie cracked a small smile at that. The tension eased out of the room, and Melissa just shook her head, biting back a smile of her own.

There. Now it was fine.  
... ... ...  
There were too many words built up in her chest. Too much anger. It had to spill out sometime.

It was just that she chose the most inconvenient of times to let her anger show.  
… … …  
Stephanie refused to look at them.

“I cannot _believe_ you got yourself expelled,” Melissa said in a low and very dangerous voice.

She didn't say anything. She counted the tiles on the floor, focusing her attention away from her parents. 

“We let the detentions slide, and the classwork you keep missing slide, and the classes you failed slide, but _this_?” 

Stephanie repeated nursery rhymes over and over in her head. She found it was a good way to get through lectures and keep a level head. Her teachers she could scream at all she liked, but she refused to be one of those obnoxious brats who yelled curses at her parents. 

“Stephanie!” her mother slammed a hand on the table. Stephanie looked up in shock. “Look at me when I am talking!”

Stephanie chewed on her lip. She didn't say a word.

Desmond put a hand on his wife's arm. “Stephanie,” he said, only slightly more calm. “This is serious.”

"I know," she mumbled. "I know it is."  
… … …  
“I don't know what to do,” Melissa mumbled into her hands. “I just don't know what to do anymore."

Desmond didn't say anything.

“What happened?” Melissa asked, not expecting any kind of answer. “What _happened_ to her?”

At the top of the stairs, Stephanie could hear every word. She knotted her hands together and bit her lip. She never wanted them to get hurt by what she did. Not ever.  
… … …  
All Stephanie had ever wanted from the world was a purpose. Something to do with her life. But there was nothing. She could find nothing at all. So she stayed quiet and then she lashed out and all she got out of it was expulsion, and all her family got was hurt. So she had to go. 

She pulled her hood up and walked down the road. She didn't look back at her house, where the lights were all off and she had locked the door behind her. Hopefully it would be morning before her parents realized she was gone. She didn't want to wake them up on top of everything else.

It was cold and it was snowing. She shoved her hands deep into her pockets. When she reached the end of the road, she thought about turning around, heading back home. Try to fit in, maybe try to do what they wanted.

She thought about it. Then she kept walking.  
… … …  
“Want to come back to my place?”

Stephanie felt like refusing. Fletcher had annoying hair and an annoying face and an annoying voice and when he talked she wanted nothing more than to belt him right in the mouth. 

But his smile was kind. His smile was kind and sweet and it had been so long since she remembered anyone smile like that at her.

She considered for a few moments. “Sure.”

He grinned and held out his hand.


End file.
